Hartford town employees may be one their own for health insurance

Hartford officials are working against the clock to figure out a plan for next year’s coverage. Health care premiums for town employees have nearly doubled for 2014, and with the new year approaching, officials must quickly decide how and if the town will continue to provide insurance.

Hunter Rieseberg is the town manager. He said the premiums for next year came in a staggering 50 percent higher than this years. The town has come up with a few ways to trim down the price, but will still have to pay a significant amount more than previous years.

The first option is for Hartford to renew with their current provider by December first for a lower premium, but according to officials, it would still be a 23 percent increase. The second option is to switch health care carriers all together. That would have to be done by the first of the year and Riesberg said it would still be a 21 percent increase. The third is for the town of Hartford to drop coverage all together, giving its workers an allowance to purchase their own insurance through the online exchange, but Hartford workers are hoping they can keep their current plans.

Patricia Stark works in the Hartford Town Offices and said she hopes she doesn’t have to change plans. “I would certainly prefer not to have to do that simply because it’s really nice here if we have a question about our insurance we have somebody we can go to in house to tell us how to handle it, so it would just be a pain in the you know what.” The Select Board will meet Tuesday night to further discuss the options. WPTZ tried reaching out to the health care provider to get an answer about the jump in prices, but weren't able to get through.